


undone, for the last time

by wanderlustt (orphan_account)



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Angst, F/M, One-Sided Attraction, Teenage Drama
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-07
Updated: 2020-02-07
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:47:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22594294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/wanderlustt
Summary: “I wish I could make you smile the way Ren did.”Makoto doesn’t waver. “You did, once."
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Niijima Makoto, Amamiya Ren/Niijima Makoto
Comments: 3
Kudos: 48





	undone, for the last time

**Author's Note:**

> i just finished persona 5 and am feeling many things...

It begins on a Tuesday night when Akechi discovers old photographs of the Makoto’s life before the Phantom Thieves.

She’s far more proper -- not of lick of hair is out of place and her uniform is freshly pressed, her face is much more sullen, perhaps a bit resentful, slinking in the shadow of her sister’s glory and success. The whole composition is muddled, and it gives her an adversely villainous quality, which is somewhat hilarious given her family lineage.

Still, looks are deceiving and Akechi would know.

“But if I didn’t know you any better, I’d say you had eyes that were poised to kill,” he tells her over dinner, full of whimsy and cheer, careful to watch for Sae’s watchful gaze. “Suffice to say you would’ve made an excellent villain in another life, Niijima-san.”

Makoto just blinks at him, toying with kernels of rice in her bowl. “That’s…random,” she says— _because it is_ and because it’s complacent enough to sound like a compliment disguised as an insult. Truthfully, she’s not sure how to take it and he prefers it that way. What's life without a little mystery and intrigue, after all?

“It’s a good thing,” he reassures her. “It means you have depth of perception. It’ll make you an excellent prosecutor one day, just like your sister.”

“Right. Because those qualities are the only things conducive to becoming a great public prosecutor,” Sae says, somewhat disdainfully, but vigilant enough to keep her bitterness from spilling over.

Makoto just lowers her gaze, wilting.

Akechi doesn’t mind the tension, for what it's worth. Must be a sister-thing, he thinks, no need for him to intrude on something clearly outside his purview.

He thanks Sae for having him over for dinner. “ _Next time you keep a student that late on a school night maybe you can treat him to something more extravagant, perhaps sushi?_ ” To which Sae just sighs and says he can buy himself sushi with all that television money.

Makoto, who looks more and more disinterested as the night goes on, just looks away as they clear the table together. He can’t get a good read on her because she’s tucked away any verifiable signal that she’d enjoyed his company; and now that dinner is over, he's left wondering if she’s glad he’ll be gone in moments to come.

For now, he tucks the photograph in his back pocket and smiles. “Thanks for having me,” he says, and before he can get one foot out the door, Makoto calls out for him to wait.

He _thinks_ there’s a flutter of anticipation deep in his gut. He can’t quite say.

When she offers him his fountain pen, he feels a wedge of disappointment sidle up inside him instead. “You forgot this,” she says softly, holding it out—and it’s a particularly ugly pen, one that had been gifted to him after he solved a particularly gruesome double-suicide murder that taken place in the suburbs of Yoyogi.

“Keep it,” he tells her, smiling. “Consider it a gift—for your hospitality tonight.”

“My hospitality?” She blinks again and he thinks he quite likes the look of her eyes like that, full of wonder. “Are you sure? It looks…expensive.”

It is, _and it has his name engraved on it,_ but he doesn’t mind.

He folds her hand over the pen. “I mean it,” he says in half-cheer, half-amusement—not quite missing the crease of a smile that forms on her face when she clutches the pen just a little tighter.

An eye for an eye, right?

Or in this case, a photograph for a pen.

* * *

Akechi notices _it_ fast.

For all intents and purposes, he’s always been pretty good at reading people. But Makoto is an expert in hiding— _not pretending_. Pauses punch their conversations because she likes to stop and consider what to say before actually speaking. She thinks too much about how she’ll come across, always wanting to be constructive but never overbearing. (The sister of a lawyer through and through, he thinks.) Even on the topic of something as menial as college and future aspirations, she's overtly cautious.

He quite likes it, he thinks. A considerate girl means more than just a considerate girl. He imagines what it'd be like to introduce her to his mother, if she were alive -- or his father, if he weren't such an asshole. He'd like to ask her to dinner -- "my mother would love you," he'd tell her -- and it's just the kind of thing that would make a girl swoon. But as fate would have it, his mother was dead and his father was an asshole, so there was no such luck for him.

She learns to confide in him, at least for a little while. She has apprehensions about the future. He tells her that's not uncommon. She tells him he's so put-together for someone her age. He reminds her he's just the same as her. She laughs a little. "We're not the same at all," she tells him. He thinks she's joking. (She's not.)

So it's no surprise that he's the first to notice a tick of change.

She starts becoming easier to read the more she hangs out with _Ren_. She starts _sulking_ _less_. She starts wearing her heart on her sleeve, she stops pausing, starts saying what’s on her mind, and doesn’t try and hide her smile. Sometimes she'll say the wrong thing and follow up with "sorry, let me rephrase that," instead of thinking what she meant to say through. It's a subtle change, but just enough to make Akechi startled.

He thinks maybe he’s gotten her all wrong.

* * *

When he runs into her on the Ginza line, he greets her with a half-smile that spells trouble and she decides to reciprocate the gesture of good faith with a bow, albeit begrudgingly. “No need to be so formal,” he tells her, laughing. “We’re friends, aren’t we?”

“Friends?” The word sounds foreign on her tongue, as if it’s a thought she’s never given consideration before. “I suppose acquaintances would be more apt, wouldn't it?"

“Oh, you wound me.”

It’s true. It stings.

She’s become wary of him, for whatever reason. Yes, it's been some time since they last met, but he’s not sure why she's become so cystic with that face of hers. He’ll have to run through the timeline of their relationship in excruciating detail to figure it out, but it’s enough to make him pause. _And Akechi never pauses_. Especially not with Makoto.

“I feel as if I’ve done something to offend you, Niijima-san,” he laughs again, ready to offer an apology while studying that expression on her face—firm and cold, as if she’s already made up her mind about him. Something about it rings true and the revelation is all too sad to consider. He knows it's too late to change her mind. "Have I?"

“You’re a celebrity disguised as a detective,” she tells him, and she’s right, but he’s also disguised as so much more she’ll never know. “The vitriol you spout on television—it’s reprehensible, not to mention irresponsible.”

She's become bolder, perhaps a bit more crass. He doesn't remember her like this; frankly, he doesn't remember her being so assertive, but memories are fickle. More often than not, they're muddled in retrospect; as a detective, he'd seen his fair share of false recollections. The mind sees what it wants to see -- it coils and slithers like a snake until reality becomes something much easier to stomach.

“Ah, I see. Perhaps I’ve rubbed you the wrong way,” he offers, and suddenly the apology sitting in his mouth is reeling back because he knows what this means—he’s had his hunches about the Phantom Thieves, he’s made his stance on them known, and he knows her bitterness today is no coincidence. Backing down now would be no better than showing weakness, right? “Could it be that you caught me on TV last night? Perhaps you find yourself sympathetic to the plight of the Phantom Thieves."

“Perhaps so,” her words are barbed with poison and she’s just short of hissing at him. “Or perhaps our ideas of justice are just irreconcilable.”

Akechi will never know but those words will change the course of their relationship forever. Like all things, he’ll only see it in retrospect, when it's too far gone. “My—all this from one television appearance?” He laughs again, hoping to clear the air of whatever tension is still sitting thick between them. “I would’ve expected more from you."

"Sorry to disappoint." She doesn't look like she means it.

"No great disappointment, believe me, Niijima-san," he doesn't mean it either, but there's enough lying to go around for two.

Makoto doesn’t give him anything more except a contemptuous glare. Just as she’s about to offer him some holier-than-thou diatribe defending the Thieves, _Ren_ appears and all that seething is apparently forgotten.

She smiles his way like she’s just caught sight of some priceless treasure only she can touch, all but forgetting Akechi at the platform.

As she runs off, he’s left alone.

But that’s alright.

He’ll watch her from a distance.

Her silent guardian, a shadow in the dark.

He’ll do what Ren can’t.

* * *

He starts seeing less and less of Sae these days, which means he sees less and less of Makoto too. He’s busy with case work, _schoolwork_ , and the television gigs in between don’t do much to help his already demanding schedule. He's not sure they want to see him; and he's not sure he wants to see them either, but one thing is clear: he hasn't stopped thinking about her since the day they met on the Ginza line. He can't stop thinking about her and he can't stop thinking about _Ren_.

It’s not fair, he thinks. He knew Makoto first. He knew her before the Phantom Thieves, knew her before this— _this_ rottenness.

Knew her before this perverted sense of injustice sprouted inside her like an insidious network of vines.

When he pulls out the photograph of her from his pocket and studies her hardened edges, that facade of control sheltering all the repressed rage and bitterness, he wonders if he’s gotten her wrong all along.

 **makoto** : Apologies for the intrusion  
**makoto** : Would you mind meeting me downstairs?  
**makoto** : I’ll be waiting in the lobby

There’s a flutter in his stomach when he sees her name flash across the screen of his phone and suddenly he all but forgets what transpired between them on the train platform.

Instead, he slips on his jacket and rushes down the steps of his complex while whipping up a response.

 _I’m on my way_.

Through the door he goes, greeting her with a smile, practiced and true, but she doesn’t offer him anything but a look. _The look_.

“Your pen,” she says, holding out the ugly golden thing like it's some kind of infected garbage. "I came to return it."

Akechi looks amused, and some part of him _is_ , but the better part of him is disappointed. “You came all this way to deliver a fountain pen?”

Still, she’s adamant.

So he takes it.

And she turns to leave.

It's hard to recognize _a_ _moment_ when it's happening, but Akechi does. His fingers twitch to grab her by the wrist, _to stop her in her steps_ , but he's not nearly fast nor desperate enough to do so. However wounded his pride is, it's still there, screaming for him to stand his ground, even as the very image of her is slipping away--

“I wish I could make you smile the way Ren did," he blurts out, somewhat uncharacteristically, given the nature of their soured relationship. But it's out there now; and in a way, he's free.

Makoto doesn’t waver, meeting his gaze over her shoulder. “You did, once."

He knows things will never be the same.

And yet.

* * *

They’re on different paths now—winding, torturously winding, but where their destinations lead are the same.

She’ll ride off into the sunset with Ren—because the hero always gets the girl. And Makoto is _the girl_ a hero deserves. He doesn't find a moment to tell her goodbye, not when the walls come tumbling down, not when she's calling out his name on the other side. "Akechi!" There's pounding and he convinces himself it's her -- she's changed her mind about him; she knows that now; she's going to follow a new path, _the right path_.

But the pounding goes away, and so does the cry of his name.

He untucks the photo of Makoto from his back pocket and studies her face: that battle-hardened exterior never did leave her, even now, and suffice to say some silly little part of him has fallen in love with it.

So when shadows descend and Akechi takes his last breath, he does so with a smile, knowing she'll live to see a better day ahead.

**Author's Note:**

> let's talk about how sexii joker and akechi are on [twitter](https://twitter.com/wanderlu5tt)


End file.
